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Kingsford Huray Development paid a hefty S$830 million for the Normanton Park estate. But it has been blocked from selling units there after complaints of shoddy work. Photo: Serene Goh

Why Hong Kong-linked Kingsford Development can’t sell flats on a US$600 million Singapore property

  • Kingsford Development once made headlines for the opulence of its chairman’s US$24 million Singapore home.
  • Now its shoddy work at an estate it bought for US$600 million has it back in the news for all the wrong reasons
Singapore
Serene Goh

Within Singapore’s exclusive Sentosa Cove enclave is a two-storey house shaped like a grand piano, with a swimming pool on its roof, a living area that opens out to the waterfront, a black Rolls-Royce in the porch and a blue Bentley parked nearby.

The property, on an 18,794 square-foot plot, put owner Cui Zhengfeng in the news in 2014, when he paid S$33 million (US$24.35 million) for it. The board chairman of the Hong Kong-linked Kingsford Development Pte Ltd is a Chinese national turned Singapore citizen.

Since arriving on the Singapore scene in 2011, his group has gained a reputation for splashing out on land for condominium projects, paying property agents more than the market rate, and hosting parties where guests go home with expensive watches won in lucky draws.

Cui Zhengfeng’s opulent home in Sentosa Cove, Singapore. Photo: Serene Goh

But the Kingsford group has also had to deal with unhappy buyers complaining of shoddy work, and action by the authorities to get it to shape up on safety at its work sites and the quality of its projects.

Kingsford Huray Development paid a hefty S$830 million (US$612 million) in 2017 to buy the ageing Normanton Park estate at well above the asking price in a collective sale, and that was before paying over S$500 million more in redevelopment fees and to top up its lease to 99 years.

But this year, authorities blocked it from selling the project’s nearly 1,900 new units until it proves they are in a fit state to be released.

NEW CROP OF PLAYERS 

Chinese developers have made their presence felt in Singapore over the past decade, with investments totalling US$2.5 billion in just the few years up to 2016.

Some began as building contractors before becoming developers; some are boutique set-ups; still others are part of larger, multipronged operations with headquarters in China.

In 2016 alone, Chinese developers scooped up three of eight sites for sale by public tender. In 2017 and 2018, their mammoth bids hogged the headlines.

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While Kingsford Development made the news for Cui’s swish home and big land purchases, its Hillview Peak and Waterbay developments, as well as affiliated Kingsford Construction Pte Ltd, have drawn the ire of the authorities and buyers.

Issues at Hillview Peak prompted residents to form a chat group and private Facebook page to air their grievances, which ranged from seepage to busted pipes. Among them is a 35-year-old permanent resident who bought a 527 sq ft, one-bedroom apartment in the 99-year leasehold condominium in leafy Upper Bukit Timah.

Yachts at Sentosa Cove, where Cui Zhengfeng’s home is located. Photo: Bloomberg

Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said he was attracted by the green and peaceful location of the 512-unit development, and made the purchase two weeks after visiting the show flat in 2016.

He collected the keys to his S$735,000 apartment in early 2017 only to find finishes he describes as sub-par: the parquet flooring was low grade, the marble in his bathroom was cracked, the kitchen counter was stained, a glass window pane was broken and the quality of his bedroom and bathroom doors left much to be desired.

“The whole unit was dusty and dirty,” he said. “I don’t even invite my family and friends over because it’s so embarrassing.”

Another resident had it worse. A Singaporean engineer said the flaws in his S$1.2 million, 829 sq ft, two-bedroom unit ranged from discoloured, cracked marble flooring, to fixed window panes that seeped every time it rained. Although he got his keys in February 2017, rectification took until August before he could move in.

A resident’s photo evidence of the shoddy work.

The 36-year-old, who lives there with his wife, two children and in-laws, had complained to the authorities, and paid S$1,800 for a report by a chartered building surveyor who blamed the seepage on design flaws in the building’s external facade.

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In June 2017, the area’s Member of Parliament, Low Yen Ling, organised a mediation session between angry residents and the developer. More than 100 people turned up, including Cui, his lawyers and supervisors, representatives of the Building Construction Authority (BCA), and Low, who is a Senior Parliamentary Secretary and Mayor of Singapore’s South West District.

Both apartment owners described the meeting as emotional, with several residents shouting. Cui promised to attend to the complaints. Kingsford made good on more major defects such as seepage, but minor flaws have persisted, both flat buyers said.

Residents at the development complain of poor finishing.

The buyers said it was not only the developer they were disappointed with. They wished the authorities could have done more, sooner.

FALLOUT FOR KINGSFORD

Complaints like those from Hillview Peak prompted the Controller of Housing to issue a no-sale licence to Kingsford Huray Development in January this year for its large One Normanton Park Condo of nearly 2,000 units.

That means it cannot sell any units until it clears quality audits and receives a Temporary Occupation Permit. And after that, it will still have to sell all units in the project within five years of securing the plot.

The Controller of Housing said Kingsford Huray Development had failed to meet its requirements. Responding to queries from property portal EdgeProp Singapore earlier this week, a representative of the Urban Redevelopment Authority said it had considered the developer’s track record when issuing a licence “to ensure that the interests of homebuyers are duly protected”.

Kingsford Huray is building 1,863 apartments, 19 terrace houses and eight commercial units on the site, a huge number that cannot be sold without the Controller of Housing’s prior approval in writing.

Among other things, the developer must have all units quality certified before it can apply to start selling them.

The no-sale licence is Kingsford’s third compliance dispute, at least, in two years.

In July 2017, Kingsford Construction Pte Ltd was fined S$130,000 by the Ministry of Manpower for repeated safety lapses at its Hillview Peak worksite.

The Singapore skyline. Photo: AFP

The ministry said the firm had shown a “recalcitrant attitude towards workplace safety and health” and had failed to fix issues flagged by inspectors on two occasions.

Chan Yew Kwong, the then director of the ministry’s occupational safety and health inspectorate, said Kingsford was slapped with a stiff penalty because of its “blatant disregard for safety and its repeated failures to comply with our regulatory requirements”.

Then, in December 2017, the company was ordered to stop work at its Kingsford Waterbay project after the Building and Construction Authority received feedback about “suspected construction safety issues”. The order was lifted only after rectification works were completed.

Companies should not put their workers’ lives at risk and wait for an accident to happen before taking safety seriously
Sebastian Tan, Director of Occupational Safety and Health Inspectorate

Responding to questions from This Week In Asia , Sebastian Tan, the Director of the Ministry of Manpower’s Occupational Safety and Health Inspectorate, said the ministry took a serious view of workplace health and safety issues.

Residents at the development complain of poor finishing.

“Companies should not put their workers’ lives at risk and wait for an accident to happen before taking safety seriously,” he said, adding that the ministry would not hesitate to act against errant companies – local or foreign – which “blatantly disregard workers’ safety and violate regulatory requirements”.

LOW PROFILE, HIGH STAKES

Kingsford Development was set up in 2000 by Hong Kong-registered company Kingsford Investments. The Kingsford Group has interests in property development, property management and manufacturing, with operations in Shenyang, China, and Brisbane, Australia.

Although Cui keeps a low profile, he is spoken of with some awe among industry observers and acquaintances. He is believed to have acquired three Sentosa properties over the years, and relocated to Singapore with his wife Gao Xiuhua and three of their four children.

Their eldest daughter, in her 20s, remained in Shenyang to oversee their mainland interests which, according to the group’s corporate site, occupy “a staggering 275,000 square metres of land area and 800,000 square metres of built-up area worth 75 billion yuan in sales”.

Today, Cui’s Sentosa Cove home is the registered office for Kingsford Developments Pte Ltd and Kingsford Construction, which were previously located at a commercial office address.

When This Week In Asia visited on April 17, a domestic helper said Cui was out of town. The door opened to reveal a first level filled with construction material and bundled up furniture, which others have said is a regular sight. Despite efforts to reach him, Cui was not available for comment.

His latest troubles at One Normanton Park have drawn little sympathy from some of his buyers.

The owner of the Hillview Peak one-room apartment said after hearing that the developer had been blocked from selling: “My first thought was, ‘It’s karma’.” 

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